Hot Afternoons Have Been in Montana

Based on the 1925 Nation prize-winning poem of the same name by Eli Siegel, Emmy-award winning filmmaker Ken Kimmelman's Hot Afternoons Have Been in Montana combines audio of Siegel reading his poem together with live-action shots and archival stills and illustrations. A multiple award-winner, with enthusiastic fans ranging from historian Howard Zinn to the late photographer/filmmaker Gordon Parks, Kimmelman's film—to be honest—left me mostly unmoved. Siegel's poem (read by the poet in the characteristic sing song monotone of most poetry readings) is a kind of six degrees of separation (the popular Kevin Bacon movie association game) on a large ideological scale, illustrating how hot afternoons in Montana (which have been witness to beautiful sweeping vistas and ugly bloody war) can be seen as universal (in that blue skies and conflict occur everywhere throughout history—“was not Montana here in the Middle Ages”). William Carlos Williams wrote of Siegel's poem: “I say definitely that that single poem, out of a thousand others written in the past quarter century, secures our place in the cultural world.” But while I can appreciate the beautiful pastoral shots in the film (less so, the flashing illustrations of notable personages such as Samuel Johnson, name-checked in the poem), I'm just not convinced that Siegel's meditative poem (which, despite the accolades, is not a staple of American poetry anthologies) is improved by a literally filmed adaptation. Still, considering the subjective nature of responses to pieces like this—including many whose opinions I very much respect—this is a strong optional purchase. Aud: H, C, P. (R. Pitman)